Drugs Are Good

I survived the night, and actually slept pretty deeply. I went back to the doctor today. Since my ears still hurt a little he looked in them with the thing that connects to the TV so I can see inside my own ears. It's so awesome to see the inside of the ear! My ears were normal, and my throat is no longer irritated. I told him about the annoying sneezing, and he asked me if I had a history of allergies. I said no, but that my dad does. He then used a couple of English words that I didn't know. He wasn't sure if he was saying/spelling them right, so looked them up in the Korean-English dictionary. He was using the right words, but I explained that they were medical words so I didn't know what they were. It apparently wasn't that important, because he moved on. He said that I probably have some kind of allergy, so gave me the same drugs as before, along with a half tablet allergy pill. Whatever that drug is, it is FANTASTIC. I still have a constant dull headache made worse by loud noise and my head feels weird, but the sneezing, runny nose, and watery eyes have completely stopped.

There were two new students in the adult class. They seem to be at a lower level than the others. When I got back from the doctor's office, Grace, Nicole, and Jennifer were still at school. I asked Joelle why they were still there, and she said that they were there to talk to Mr. Kim. They're not happy about the class changing from 5 days a week to 3 days a week, but she said that because of the economic situation at the school that Mr. Kim wouldn't change his mind. I knew we'd lost a lot of students, but this is the first I've heard of money problems--that's why Mr. Kim looks stressed.

After the mothers' conversation with Mr. Kim, the class will still be 3 days per week, but I'll teach all the days, and they won't have a Korean teacher at all. They don't want to study grammar or other "boring" things (actually, they don't want to study at all outside of class), but they only want to have fun and get more fluent at speaking. Well, if they don't learn from their mistakes then they won't improve at all. From what I've seen, they think that having a class with me will magically make them improve in English. The magic secret to improving in English is . . . HARD WORK.

The kids were pretty good all day; it helped that Brandon was absent. I asked Mina to order me fried mandu for dinner, but she ordered bimbim-mandu instead, so I couldn't eat all of it. I asked other teachers if they wanted some of the mandu, and Miro was going to use my chopsticks--uh, not a good idea! They are not at ALL careful about germs! I expected them to eat the mandu that I hadn't touched, but they also ate some of the salad that my chopsticks had been all over. It's no secret that I've been sick, so it's all their fault if they get sick!

As I was working on my computer a message popped up that the website meeting at Dave's academy tomorrow has been cancelled. YES!! That means I can sleep in. I'm feeling so much better tonight that perhaps I'll even try to get back into exercising after 4 days off, slowly to start.

I tried to access the website with the gruesome videos so I could see the Korean guy's last words, but either their site is down from too much traffic, or the rumor that the Korean government is blocking websites who show the video is true. I thought Korea was a democratic country--what's up with the censorship?